I finally put some time into this site and got some of my games posted and did some game scores. Eventually I should put a review or two up. I don't think I will ever take the time to put up everything but 120 games listed is a good start. I just bought my 3rd game of the year (so much for that 12 game plan). I just picked up Sonic Battle and won Metal Slug 3 on ebay so I am a bit head of schedule considering it's still January. I also returned Condemned and got my twenty bucks back, (so at least I am not buying everything in site.) Now I just need to finish Bionic Commando for the Gameboy and put up my review. I'm being a bit random besides that's what blogs are for. Besides it's not like my articulate posts got much attention anyways..

Ever get collectoritis? The symptoms include: spending more time shopping for games than you spend playing them, owning more games than you can possibly play, having games still in the shrinkwrap, or do you own games for a system you don’t own. If this sounds familiar you may have collectoritis. I contracted it years ago when I worked at a videogames store. I began buying lots of great games but I didn’t have much time to play them. I soon started a collection I would never play. I few years later when I worked at another videogame store I began buying a few games every month and maybe playing them for an hour and then moving on to something else. Recently I thought I was getting better. I had actually seen the ending to a few of the games I owned. I had sold off some of my collection that I figured I would never get around to. Then Christmas season came around and I was out shopping. I bought sixteen games in two months. (Gears of War, Castlevania Dawn of Sorrows, Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin, Stella Deus, Rainbow 6 Vegas, Ridge Racer 5, Condemned, Sneak King, Pocketbike Racer, Big Bumpin, Samurai Showdown 5, Aerowings 2, Scurge Hive, Capcom Classics Mini Mix Shaman King: Master of Spirits 2 and Valkyrie Profile 2.) Mind you I got them at great prices, but it’s money wasted on games I will never get around too. I don’t even own a DS and I now own four games for one. Guess how many of these games sit unplayed? 7. On the plus side I beat two out of three games on Mini Mix and finished Big Bumpin, Sneak King sucks and Pocketbike Racer is not fun without other people, I found out I like Aerowings 1 better than 2, Samurai Showdown V needs and arcade stick, I played Stella Deus for a half and hour, I also rented Phantasy Star Universe and put 2.5 hours into it. And I started Shaman King: Master of Spirits 1. But now I need to recover. I am trying a twelve-step plan… that is 12 games a year. One a month. I should actually be buying less than this but at my current rate this is cutting down a lot. Here is my list. Titles may change but this should help me keep focused on a few titles rather than ALL titles. Here is my list so far. 1 Half Life Collection 360 2 Virtual Fighter 5 360 3 Bioshock 4 DDR 360 5 Shadowrun 360 6 Shadow of Colossus 7 Lumines Plus PS2 8 Lost Planet CE 9 River City Ransom EX 10 Propeller Arena 11 Predator Xbox 12 Beatmania (Somehow I need to still fit Halo 3 and SNK VS Capcom DS on that list. Maybe I will drop Beatmania and DDR.) My eyes were so wide this week I started looking for Sin and Punishment, considered buying Namco X Capcom, and I almost bought Splatterhouse for the NES. (I can’t even play import PS2 games so Namco X Capcom would be worthless to me.) I just keep looking for games when I should be playing them instead. Anyways if you or someone you know has collectoritis help them by putting a controller in their hand and a great game (they already own) on the TV and remind them there was a reason they started buying games in the first place.

I have Tenchu 2 for PS but I am looking for something a little more up to date. I am considering Farcry for 360, Paraha, or RPG maker. I was hoping to find something better though. If anyone has any suggestions please let me know.

I am now wanting a new Fighters Megamix for the 360. It will have characters from Virtual Fighter 4, Jet Set Radio Future, Gunvalkyre, , Shenmue, Phantasy Star Online/Phantasy Star Universe, Space Channel 5, Joe Montana, Seaman, Yakuza and Space Harrier. and maybe Afterburner, Outrun, Last Bronx, Fighting Vipers 2, and cars from Full Auto and the new Sega Rally. Sega could really make my year but they won't. It's fun to dream though. That would be a really great game.

I have been playing tons of the demo for this game. I figured I should post the controls I have figured out so far. Many details of this will be for people who have never played the game before so bare with me. The guage in the lower left hand corner. -left curve is a noise guage -the center character/symbol is your statis -Green= unseen -Yellow= detected -on fire= seen and wanting to attack you -the number represents your distance from your nearest opponent. -lower right gauge with ninja star is your visibility meeter. -the red guage above this is your health When you start you will pick your character -M/F -Face -Clothes The 2nd character is who will make a cameo. The 2nd character has a wider clothing selection. You will then pick your stats for your character. I have not confirmed what the 3 types are but here are my guesses. 1st stat is health (I am sure of this one) 2nd stat is damage 3rd is speed CONTROLS L+X= draw, sheith sword Y= use items/throw stars/grappling hook B= block A= jump A+R+direction in battle will dodge in that direction A+L= long jump A+R= invert jump LB= 1st person -left annalog zooms in and out in this mode RB= crawl RB+X= upper slash if armed RB+X= pick up items or bodies >if a body +X to drop +Y to throw (a very damaging attack to unaware opponents) RB in water= using reed RB+A+direction= roll X= the killing of a nearbuy opponent if armed X= the holding of a nearbuy opponent if unarmed +X = kill them +Y =release them +B= stun them +RB= push them to the floor X+R+pressing backward= heavy attack R= lock onto opponents back= live map digital pad up=grappling hook down=health pack left= move icon left right= move icon right Jumping on walls+ RB+ you cling to wall +left or right= you run on wall +A+ you jump off wall (you can zigzag up walls) Stealth Killing= you will see a red ring when you are near a unaware oponent/held aponent. If you press the X button when the ring is redist AKA when you hear the heart beat you will hear a noice. I have no idea yet what this does. Misc. stars can be thrown while haging from ledges. I hope this guide is useful to someone. I am really looking forward to the full version.

Now I am going to cry like a little girl with a skinned knee... cause thats what blogs are for. Japan is now getting 50 exclusive games for the 360. Why? Sony's PS3 is region free and Nintendo's Wii is region optional. Why would you now promote 50 games to be released in only one region. I really hope they will not be region encoded. Or the reality is they may not be that great anyways. But the reason I started this is because I want Yie Ar Kung Fu. I bet it will have updated graphics and VS play (like the GBA version.) I really would have fun playing this on Live. Whine whine. I am now done complaining about not getting a game I already own two versions of. Now I just wonder what the other 49 exclusives are.

“Current generation machines, including the PS2 and PSP, will also receive versions of the popular franchises - but Xbox 360 will be the only option for fans who want to experience next-gen FIFA and Pro Evo.” (quote from gameindustry.biz) EA owns football and now MS owns football (soccer) for a year. Big news, not that it was too difficult to do. 4 football games were on the top ten selling games list at one time in Europe so it’s not like they cornered the market. It keeps EA from having to press out an bland first generation FIFA (they seem to make their next gen advances on time but lacking in features) PS3 players can get the PS2 version and play it on their new system. The reason I bring this up though is that it is a big deal. I don’t think people in America realize the strides that MS is making towards world recognition. In everywhere but America Football is a huge deal. Being able to see HD FIFA on a friends 360 may be enough to make them go out and buy one. I am impressed by this move. It’s not groundbreaking but it makes a difference. Another great move MS made was Ninety Nine Nights. Now while this game may seem like a Dynasty Warriors clone; a game that people like myself abhore. To me Dynasty Warriors has always been a 2 button masher (not a fighter) that was boring and had just enough features to keep the next version interesting to its fans, while never improving the graphics engine. But in Japan Dynasty Warriors is one of the top ten sellers for the year. The Japanese really love their Koei games and this is no exception. The other thing Japanese gamers love is CG intros. And this is why N3 was such a great move. MS made a really beautiful Dynasty Warriors clone that had a large number of characters with stunning CG movies. This game may have been panned in the US but this is exactly the kind of exclusive they needed to try to fight for Japan. I applaud their effort but the question is will this be enough to make dents outside of the US?

No Bully for XBox were the words I read. WTH…I was looking forward to this. Title after title is being knocked of the XBox system. And why you may ask, well here’s the problem. The XBox is fighting the 360 and MS is paying the price. See it is one thing to be backwards compatible. It is another to not be able to an exciting new game released for the old generation that looks great but you can’t play it. Most people trade their XBox towards their 360, not really caring about some old games they beat a thousand time or ever cared to get in the first place, and then a game like Black will come out and they will want to get it, but they can’t because the new system doesn’t support it yet. This causes a problem for developers because some of your pool of XBox gamers have jumped into the 360 pool and you have no tributary. So you have less XBox gamers to sell to than you had a year ago rather than more and XBox gamers. XBox not being the dominate system last generation means it is not necessarily worth publishing on it if your user base is continually shrinking. This is unlike the jump from the PS to the PS2 where you could buy a brand new PS1 game, take it home and be able to play it on your PS2. (I would say PS2 to PS3 but considering no one has used that feature yet were not going to talk about it) I am curious how the new MK will work. They say they will be able to get BC for 360 at release. I really hope so.

Let me start out by saying I love fighting games. I will try most any fighting game to see if it’s good. I loved the Dreamcast in part because it had more fighting games than any other system. But now that I have played so many I have a few questions…. Why is the end guy x2 as powerful as any other character in the game? I spend as much time working my way to the end guy as I do fighting them. This has to stop. I miss the latter of a gradual increasing of difficulty working to a difficult but not impossible end guy. And on this note why to some three hit combos take off a third of my life? And why can some end guys kill me in two moves. KOFMI and DOA4 are good examples. It only leads to frustration to fight a good fight and get killed in two (once started cannot be blocked) combos. It’s cheap. Make good AI not cheap bosses. I have to admit I hated Akuma but he is arguably the best end guy ever. He fought fair but was just a better fighter than most. Another thing is why do I have to beat the game with every character to open things up? This might be tolerable if we didn’t have the invincible end guy problem. I am willing to finish with every character to open their ending or their costumes, but that’s it. After opening everything in Tekken 1 2 3 and Tag. DOA 2, 2 hardcore, 3, Bloody Roar GC, and almost everything in Tekken 4, unlocking everyone but Tengu in DOA 4, still working on the final survival items in DOAU, and many other fighters I am too lazy to mention I just don’t feel this endless beat the game with everyone is worth while. We need a new system. And why in DOA do I have to beat the game multiple times with the same character to open another costume? Wasn’t once enough? The goals should be attainable. A tough choseable AI and a fun battle system should be what keeps people playing not getting the 32nd ending and the 150th costume. Socal and VF seem to have gotten this why can’t anyone else? Also attaining random items from defeated foes is also a lame reward system. Also the endings please let us watch them at will after we beat the game once. We earned it. Endings should be well done. Why do we need to see a photo with text. Put some effort into it. Socal2 was so disappointing after years of great endings we only get a few pictures with text. DOA and Tekken are great examples of how to do an ending. As I said I love fighting games. It is just that after renting DOA4 I was filled with frustration at one of the best fighters I have ever played. I had an impossible end guy that I was having to beat a thousand times just to open some costumes. And I was trying to beat her using characters that I am just not very good with. I miss the days of getting to know one character and one character well instead of 80 characters OK. Anyways this is my weekly rant. Just please make my fighting games more palatable.

Today I realized the reason cell phone games don't sell well in the US. Cars. Yes cars. We are driving while others are taking mass transit and playing games. Nothing too big. I just wanted to share.